Q P R Propose Move To New Ground...

[Nogbad the Bad]

I feel sorry for you. Your small time thinking is typical of so many Bristolians.

Have you even ever left Bristol?

 

Where's the small time thinking?

 

I support a redeveloped AG which will give City a capacity to rival many current PL teams, and - we're told - provide vastly increased income from other sources.

 

I don't support an oversized new stadium filled with non City fans.

 

That's my position, and I'm quite content with it.

 

Ii you want to join in the debate then put forward your arguments, but please leave out this 'I feel sorry for you' nonsense, it's not helpful to good debate, or relevant.

 

As for 'Have you even ever left Bristol' Yes, I've worked abroad for 6 months, and in London.

 

By the way, you seem very critical of Bristolians.

 

Are you a Bristolian yourself, and do you support/ have you ever supported another club?

 

I think that's far more relevant to how we may feel about BCFC's future and Ashton Gate itself.

[Nogbad the Bad]

How dare you? What on earth gives you the right to question how much I care about this football club. You utterly contemptible man.

That you're stuck in the dark ages (A case proven over years of inane, backward postings) does not make you any more caring about this football club. In fact, it makes me feel sick that old men like yourself not only want to hold this club back and sit idly in the status quo, but also this entire nation. Held back by conservative thinking and conservative voting.

BCFC will be here a hell of long time after your death, and mine. How dare you put your moronic, anti-progressive agenda ahead of the continued survival of this football club.

Clearly you have no foresight whatsoever, that's been made abundantly clear. The whole point in getting people through the doors is to eventually convert them to the cause. How the hell do you think fans watching their first game of football are converted? It's not all following dad, especially in a city over-run with 'outsiders' who have moved here and have no allegiance to this city or this club.

 

No wonder the city is such a horrible laughing stock, I bet you voted for Red Trousers too.

 

Oh dear, some very unpleasant personal comments in that post, Jordan.

 

Completely over the top and unnecessary.

[Barrs Court Red]

Where's the small time thinking?

I support a redeveloped AG which will give City a capacity to rival many current PL teams, and - we're told - provide vastly increased income from other sources.

I don't support an oversized new stadium filled with non City fans.

That's my position, and I'm quite content with it.

Ii you want to join in the debate then put forward your arguments, but please leave out this 'I feel sorry for you' nonsense, it's not helpful to good debate, or relevant.

As for 'Have you even ever left Bristol' Yes, I've worked abroad for 6 months, and in London.

By the way, you seem very critical of Bristolians.

Are you a Bristolian yourself, and do you support/ have you ever supported another club?

I think that's far more relevant to how we may feel about BCFC's future and Ashton Gate itself.

Im hugely critical of the baby boomer generation who now fear and resist change. You only need look at the resistance to anything proposed in Bristol, while the surrounding counties have no such issues.

The general population is rising, and there are tens of thousands of new homes planned for the surrounding area. Why do you think the blue few want to double their capacity.

[Nogbad the Bad]

Just listened to Cotterill on the league radio show and the presenter stated that we have a massive city with untapped potential and a large caption area.

 

As you well know, an average crowd of say 10,000 is made up of people who attend to varying degrees, say 6k every match, 2k twenty games 1k fifteen games  1k every six or so games. I don't know the exact scientific figures but it covers about 20,000 regular attendees. If you are successful those figure increase.

That I believe is what should be aiming for, a steady increase in regular watchers.  I don't want to see our stadium filled with people who are not there supporting the team but, you have to get then there first and then win them over. If we attract people who go because of the opposition then some might return to watch more and hopefully become regular supporters, as many have done over the years. I'm sure you and all of us know people who are lapsed supporters, or people who would attend matches if there were attractive games and opposition and more importantly, a chance of success. This area has been so starved of anything that resembles success that it meekly accepts that, and can't be bothered to strive for anything that might be a little risky and upset the applecart of mediocrity.

I understand your feelings regarding regular attendees at the gate and the comeradery amongst those. Ask yourself this, how many fans standing/sitting near you have been there as long as you and how many no longer go, over say a twenty year period.

I'll bet it's changed a great deal, with others taking their place, Our crowds were comparable to the old second div over recent seasons, so it's concieveable that we could once more achieve those higher attendances, however infrequently, if we did ever reach the promised land. The challenge is to stay there and sustain success, a task never before achieved, why restrict your chances financially with restricted capacity? After all, when the capacity was 42,000, you probably didn't complain about playing in a stadium a quater to half full.

 

We haven't got 20k regular attendees, we.ve got 8.5k regulars and a few thousand who go down now and again. It's really not 20k. regulars over the season or anything like that..

 

The out of town presenter who told Cotterill about our 'massive city, untapped potential, large caption area' had no knowledge of the make up of the population and didn't take Rovers ( not big crowds, but many thousands of non attendees who dislike, and will never watch City) or the popularity of Rugby into account. It's not like Newcastle where everyone supports the local team and will fill their stadium, it's very different here and anyone who lives here knows that.

 

We need regularly exciting performances from a team we can rely on to do their best, a team we can identify with, to just keep what we've got, let alone increase attendances.

 

I know lots of former/lapsed supporters, most left Bristol a long time ago and have made their lives elsewhere. They won't be coming back.

 

When the capacity was 42,000 we filled it once in my lifetime, v.Liverpool. Most of the ground in those days was terracing where lower crowds were less noticable -banks of empty seats at AV would be far more so, and a very depressing sight and atmosphere killer.

[Jordan Tansley]

Stuck in the past. Simple sentence that sums you up.

[Roger Red Hat]

You can't really attack someone for being a conservative and then insinuate they voted for a left wing liberal because of it.. Makes no sense..

But yes, a hell of a lot of people seem to want a bygone age brought back by doing the club progressing. The club needs to keep creating it's history, whatever it does will be part of that.. Hopefully one moving forward and giving fans something to be proud of.

Left wing? Eh!?

[Rich]

We haven't got 20k regular attendees, we.ve got 8.5k regulars and a few thousand who go down now and again. It's really not 20k. regulars over the season or anything like that..

 

The out of town presenter who told Cotterill about our 'massive city, untapped potential, large caption area' had no knowledge of the make up of the population and didn't take Rovers ( not big crowds, but many thousands of non attendees who dislike, and will never watch City) or the popularity of Rugby into account. It's not like Newcastle where everyone supports the local team and will fill their stadium, it's very different here and anyone who lives here knows that.

 

We need regularly exciting performances from a team we can rely on to do their best, a team we can identify with, to just keep what we've got, let alone increase attendances.

 

I know lots of former/lapsed supporters, most left Bristol a long time ago and have made their lives elsewhere. They won't be coming back.

 

When the capacity was 42,000 we filled it once in my lifetime, v.Liverpool. Most of the ground in those days was terracing where lower crowds were less noticable -banks of empty seats at AV would be far more so, and a very depressing sight and atmosphere killer.

No offence intended but you do seem to have a closed mind to things. I've been attending for 48 years now and, we have had loads of offical attendances over what is planned at AG in that time, and many more attendances that were understated. The vast majority of those attending were city fans who would not now be able to attend if things go as planned, the rest of us will pay more for our football to make up for that lost revenue.

[Nogbad the Bad]

No offence intended but you do seem to have a closed mind to things. I've been attending for 48 years now and, we have had loads of offical attendances over what is planned at AG in that time, and many more attendances that were understated. The vast majority of those attending were city fans who would not now be able to attend if things go as planned, the rest of us will pay more for our football to make up for that lost revenue.

 

I've been attending for 43 years Rich and I can't remember that many topping 27.5k or the 30k proposed for AV including the likely Safe Standing areas.

 

Half a dozen or so in the old Div.1,, mostly in our first season up, plus Spurs and Forest in the league Cup? Rovers and Man.Utd in Div.2? May be overlooking the odd one for Liverpool or Man.Utd, after the first season but interest did wane from an average of 23.5k in 76-77 to just under 19k in our relegation season. I'd say a crowd of even 27.5k was a very, very rare occurrence throughout.

 

There were a hell of alot more under 19k crowds in the old div.1, than there were 25k or more.That was just for the very biggest teams of the time, and of course it wasn't all ticket for away fans, and they could bring huge numbers, and were often visible in all parts of the ground.

 

Anyway, we're going round in circles - I'm not going to say you've got a closed mind because you can't accept my arguments, I respect your opinion and the time you've put in to support AV.

 

It's clear we're not going to agree though.

[Nogbad the Bad]

Stuck in the past. Simple sentence that sums you up.

 

Really good post.

 

Well done. 

[Rich]

I've been attending for 43 years Rich and I can't remember that many topping 27.5k or the 30k proposed for AV including the likely Safe Standing areas.

 

Half a dozen or so in the old Div.1,, mostly in our first season up, plus Spurs and Forest in the league Cup? Rovers and Man.Utd in Div.2? May be overlooking the odd one for Liverpool or Man.Utd, after the first season but interest did wane from an average of 23.5k in 76-77 to just under 19k in our relegation season. I'd say a crowd of even 27.5k was a very, very rare occurrence throughout.

 

There were a hell of alot more under 19k crowds in the old div.1, than there were 25k or more.That was just for the very biggest teams of the time, and of course it wasn't all ticket for away fans, and they could bring huge numbers, and were often visible in all parts of the ground.

 

Anyway, we're going round in circles - I'm not going to say you've got a closed mind because you can't accept my arguments, I respect your opinion and the time you've put in to support AV.

 

It's clear we're not going to agree though.

Without getting too technical, there have probably been twenty games that have returned gates of over the 26,500 planned for AG. Loads more under that figure, so should we go for our average over a period of 48 years or what we could possibly get. Average is about 14k so why bother going for 26k?  We've only spent about fifty percent of our time in the upper two divisions with most of that time spent struggling and not having any sustained success. The more success we had the higher our gates went but we could not sustain that. We've always had a crap stadium with poor facilities and poor views from the terracing.

Your right we're not going to agree, you settle for mediocrity and I'll strive for more.

PS.  When a survey was carried out about our attendances, by the club in the early Lansdown years, it showed that an average attendance throughout the season of 13k was made up from a pool of 20k regular attendees. That's what our fan base was and who the club used to make regular contact with.

[BS34Red]

If we made it to the prem we would hit 30-40k each week without a doubt. Settling for Ashton Gate says to me we have no ambition to ever progress into a premier league club.

Once we have committed to developing the gate we are then left with very little expansion possibilities. The situation with AV may change in the future but if we have spent 40 million at the gate is Lansdown then going to spend 90+ million plus 10 years down the line to increase capacity by 5-10k?

Ashton Vale for me still has to be the preferred option. I think it has been wise to get permission for the gate so in the short term we can improve facilities whilst hopefully still trying to move to AV.

A number of clubs have built new stands then 5 years later moved to a new stadium. Maine Road is coming to mind for some reason.

[BS34Red]

We know we can get 40k + for the big days out. I would hazard a guess that we have a fan base of 50k. Now not all of those attend, some of those may only attend once every couple of years, however they look out for results etc and as soon as a big game is on they will be down there. 20k regular attendees over the season sounds about right. Get us in the premier league and we will sell out most weeks. How many season tickets were sold before the play off final? Quite a lot if I remember in the hope we would go up . we would be the only premiership club within two hours (in this country) our fan base would expand massively if we reached the prem. Swansea have done well and have plans to expand, Cardiff also seem to be doing well with plans to expand. Personally I think we have the potential to be much bigger than either of those clubs.

[BS34Red]

We know we can get 40k + for the big days out. I would hazard a guess that we have a fan base of 50k. Now not all of those attend, some of those may only attend once every couple of years, however they look out for results etc and as soon as a big game is on they will be down there. 20k regular attendees over the season sounds about right. Get us in the premier league and we will sell out most weeks. How many season tickets were sold before the play off final? Quite a lot if I remember in the hope we would go up . we would be the only premiership club within two hours (in this country) our fan base would expand massively if we reached the prem. Swansea have done well and have plans to expand, Cardiff also seem to be doing well with plans to expand. Personally I think we have the potential to be much bigger than either of those clubs.